Does Qantas actively discourage flight redemptions?

[Flying High]

Here's the situation...

I live in Sydney. I want to fly from SYD to LAX on Business Class using points. It will let me do it, but I need to go via BNE. Now the strange thing is, if I lived in Brisbane and wanted to fly the very same days, it will route me through SYD.

In other words, whatever city I live in (SYD or BNE), Qantas forces me to travel via the other city in order to get to LAX, despite there obviously being seats available from both cities.

No problems on Virgin of course, so they get my patronage from now on.

Does Qantas actually not want me to redeem points?

 

[russ]

Flying High,

This is very interesting! You may have found the kernel of a great media story.

Can you please provide some screen shots of the issue?

Regards,
russ

 

[mannej]

Redemption seats are a science upon their own.

More info such as how far out are you looking, if you are looking at a comparable Virgin fare etc.

Each airline will only release a set amount of reward seats, and these may go quite fast on certain routes (i.e LAX etc).
I managed to find to 2 J seats on QF68 at around 6 months out (with the hurry 5 or less seats left). I snapped these up, low and behold there were no more J Classic seats left.

To get the best answer, you will probably need to speak to the Yield Management guru's at said airline.

 

[TheInsider]

Please enlighten me, why would this be a 'great media story'?

 

[markis10]

What a bonus for JASAs!

 

[Must...Fly!]

I think there was an element of sarcasm in the post.

 

[BAM1748]

And the big deal about having to go via Brisbane or Sydney is? (couple of hours) :-|

 

[MrJetset]

We have discovered this in recent months. To fly internationally from SYD you are routed via BNE or MEL. Attempt to fly directly from MEL and you are routed via SYD or MEL. I don't understand why...

 

[markis10]

We have discovered this in recent months. To fly internationally from SYD you are routed via BNE or MEL. Attempt to fly directly from MEL and you are routed via SYD or MEL. I don't understand why...

Fees for departure pax versus transit ($28)

 

[oz_mark]

Be VERY VERY careful with this. If this is happening, then there is almost certainly no trans pac business class award seats. The business class you are getting is the domestic flight from one east coast Australian city to another. It will likely be an economy seat across the Pacific either way.

 

[dajop]

I live in Sydney. I want to fly from SYD to LAX on Business Class using points. It will let me do it, but I need to go via BNE. Now the strange thing is, if I lived in Brisbane and wanted to fly the very same days, it will route me through SYD.

This sounds odd and hard to understand. If there is inventory SYD-LAX for awards, on QF I would have thought it would be there regardless of origin of flight. In some airlines you get vastly different availability depending on point of origin, particularly those that have a busy international hub (SQ and CX come to mind where you may easily get a redemption, or indeed fare in a certain class from SYD-HKG-LHR (CX) but that same award or fare class won't be available from HKG-LHR), IIRC this is know as "married sectors". But I wasn't aware that QF do this with domestic connections (although they may).

The other scenario I have seen is that the connection is not same day, for example SYD-BNE on Wed night and BNE-LAX on Thu morning, but obviously no availability BNE-LAX on Wed.

 

[MrJetset]

Be VERY VERY careful with this. If this is happening, then there is almost certainly no trans pac business class award seats. The business class you are getting is the domestic flight from one east coast Australian city to another. It will likely be an economy seat across the Pacific either way.

This is a separate issue to the mixed fare award results. This issue occurs offering both the domestic and international legs in J.

 

[oz_mark]

This is a separate issue to the mixed fare award results. This issue occurs offering both the domestic and international legs in J.

Do you have an example of one?

 

[anat0l]

When are you looking to redeem?

If you're looking at the silly season ahead of us, my guess is that all the premium seats (or most of the seats, period) on the SYD-LAX direct are gone. The first J direct flight on SYD-LAX I could find was QF11 in late January.

Unfortunately, as oz_mark alluded to, plenty of "silly" options shown for J redemptions, with the long haul sector in Y or W rather than J (the J price is due to the domestic tag flight = dumb).

Not an unusual scenario, really. Not sure why VA is wide open on the availability here (people not yet clued up yet?).

In any case, if you really want those seats and you are a Platinum, call QF and put in a Platinum request. Well worth the extra $ for phone assistance if you get the seats.

 

[MrJetset]

I look for LAX for several months in 2012. In some a few cases QF107 was available in F, everything in J was via BNE or MEL.

I had a mate fly via MEL to LAX specifically because of this issue.

 

[Flying High]

When are you looking to redeem?

If you're looking at the silly season ahead of us, my guess is that all the premium seats (or most of the seats, period) on the SYD-LAX direct are gone. The first J direct flight on SYD-LAX I could find was QF11 in late January.

Unfortunately, as oz_mark alluded to, plenty of "silly" options shown for J redemptions, with the long haul sector in Y or W rather than J (the J price is due to the domestic tag flight = dumb).

Not an unusual scenario, really. Not sure why VA is wide open on the availability here (people not yet clued up yet?).

In any case, if you really want those seats and you are a Platinum, call QF and put in a Platinum request. Well worth the extra $ for phone assistance if you get the seats.

No, looking in April/May next year. But just a lowly Silver...

My bewilderment is centred around the fact that despite there clearly being a seat allocation for FF on the SYD-LAX direct route (QF11), I could only access it if I originated from BNE. Likewise I could only access the BNE-LAX direct flight if I was originating from SYD. Doesn't make any sense to me unless Qantas was delberately making it difficult for me to redeem points for flights that I actually want.

 

[mannej]

April is school holiday time, so perhaps the difficulty there.

 

[Pushka]

This is as annoying as my recent experience booking PE from Heathrow to Melbourne. The selection was for Premium Economy, the points deducted were Premium Economy (96,000) but when you looked at the actual flight just before confirming the booking, there was a warning stating that:

"Flight heathrow to HKG in Economy"
"Flight HKG to Melb in Economy"

So none of the sectors were PE yet they would deduct PE value points and were calling it a PE booking!:evil:

Booking the exact same flights but through an Economy choice, was going to cost 64,000 points.

 

[Flying High]

April is school holiday time, so perhaps the difficulty there.

Nope, specifically looking outside school holidays...

And even if I was, it doesn't explain the bizareness of having to route through another city, despite there clearly being FF seats available...

 

[TiredOldFlyer]

Here's the situation...


Does Qantas actually not want me to redeem points?

Perhaps you have answered you own Question !